The Honeypot at Obatala
by Code743
Summary: A loose interpretation of STO ULC #28, prompt 3 - 'Abandoned'. What does Starfleet do when a first contact situation seems too good to be true? They fly in and check it out anyway, because Starfleet!


_**Notes:**_

 ** _Firstly, in response to a review, the episode 'Fluid Dynamics' does take place in 2409_ _in game._** ** _However, I've always found the concept that the entirety of STO's story content takes place in the space of two years to be improbable at best, so I have stretched things out._**

 ** _I also make mention of 'Heavy Flight Deck Cruisers' further down. This refers to the Command Battlecruiser line (Concorde, Geneva, Presidio) of in-game lore. I've made this change as they don't usually function as command ships in my headcanon, though they are seen as a sought after command for experienced captains._**

 **Senior officer's meeting room, USS Chevalier**

 **Sonhadra System, Delta Quadrant**

 **Stardate 93783.14 - October 2nd, 2416 Earth Standard**

Vice Admiral Klaban Desyox walked into the briefing room room to find his three rear admirals talking among themselves, or rather, Jeff Blackmoore talking over the other two, his strident voice filling the room with his opinion of the political situation in the Delta Quadrant. As usual, he had come around to the handling of the Kobali situation.

"...so after that went down I started extolling the virtues of cremation, I mean, as far as cultural boundaries allowed. Fair to say I'm no great fan of the Klinks, but when they say a corpse is just an empty shell, I think they might be right. But an empty shell can be a vessel that someone else can waltz right in and inhabit, with or without permission from the previous owner, like hermit crabs that live in some world's oceans."

Desyox chuckled inwardly as he looked at the blank expressions on the faces of RAUH Rezkii and RALH Mauris. Rezkii was looking at a PADD which Desyox could see was turned off, while Mauris merely made an 'mmm' noise, in the manner of someone only pretending to pay attention.

It had been nearly two years since Operation Delta Rising had commenced and the moral issues surrounding the Kobali and their reproductive methods were still the cause of heavy debate. It didn't matter; the Kobali's considerable knowledge of medical science had become valuable to the DA, whether anyone back home, thousands of light years away, liked it or not.

Blackmoore finally seemed to realise that Desyox had entered the room and and ended his rant. Blackmoore needed something to do, and Desyox was about to oblige him. It was Mauris he turned to first, however.

"You're back up to speed after 743's incident with the Borg?"

"One or two are still in ICU at AJC. Those people had been part of the collective for longer and had been more heavily altered. Their rehabilitation will take longer."

"What about those in command positions?"

"As a precaution, I've got Captain Stewart and Commander Deltcheva posted as my flag officers on the Nysrogh, while Captain Dewyer has the Naberius."

"Careful." Blackmoore put in. "Smart girl like Dewyer will get a taste for independent captaincy"

Mauris shrugged. "I'll have to cut the apron strings at some point."

"Anyway." Desyox interrupted, looking to get the conversation back on topic. "With all the work involved in helping the DA get set up out here, I've reminded Admiral Rexx and Admiral Tuvok of what our initial brief was and how little we've done to accomplish it. His response was to send me some orders, probably just to shut me up, but I figure it's better than nothing."

The three looked at him expectantly.

"Rezkki, Wing 72 is to head to these coordinates. They're in the direction of the ones that L'Miren gave us in Calbriden nearly a year ago. Command wants to do this in steps rather than rushing blindly in, so you're to go no further for now. Justicar Matthis has offered to bring a squadron of Benthan Ships to accompany you."

The Saurian studied the astrogation, before nodding.

Desyox continued. "Blackmoore, Wing 73 is going to clean out another nest of Vaadwaur. Overseer Eldex has been in touch with DA Command to say that this group is intractable and the only course left is brute force.

Blackmoore looked dubious. "You're going to trust me of all people to work with a group from a species known to be a little on the volatile side?"

"I've had the pleasure of speaking to Eldex. He's a bit more cold and calculating whereas you're more bombastic and showy, but I think you two should get along just fine from a military and strategic standpoint."

Blackmoore still wasn't convinced. "If you say so…"

Desyox turned to Mauris. "Wing 74 will be following up on a lead that Sonhadra Station has picked up on. An apparently warp-capable civilization in a star system towards the borg side of The Gulf. A Benthan consular vessel will follow you once you've established contact and Alpha Betaan and his hunting party will come along to bolster your numbers. The Obatalans presented themselves as a martial race but their technology is several decades behind ours, so they might be impressed by a wing of more advanced vessels."

"Or they might see it as confrontational and get hostile." said Blackmoore.

"Actually, they wanted us to send as many ships as we could manage, which is effectively what we're doing, with so much resource away on other assignments. I'll send you the relevant info."

Mauris nodded, but there were a couple of things that bothered him about the whole thing.

=A=

It seemed that Stephen McCode and Emeria Neves shared some of these concerns when he discussed it with the two senior captains several hours later.

"Let me get this straight." Neves said. "A warp capable civ, this close to Borg space, composed of warriors, that has escaped the notice of both the Borg and the Voth?"

"Maybe they're an offshoot of the Kazon." McCode deadpanned.

"And not only that, but their first warp flight was only a few decades back but their tech isn't that far short of ours?" Neves finished.

"Improbable circumstances like that have been found before. Back in the 2380s the USS Titan found a civilization that had developed matter/antimatter cores over a century before but had never applied the tech to FTL travel. Others have had high speed warp drive, but were still using rocket-propelled weaponry like missiles." Mauris countered. "Each species has had its own technological path."

"For what it's worth, I agree with Emeria, but orders are orders I guess. So when do we leave?" McCode asked.

"I still need to meet with Betaan, but I'm looking at leaving this time tomorrow. That way we can fly the first part of the journey with Rezkii's carrier group and Benthan escort."

"And we can call them back if we run into trouble." McCode quipped.

Mauris was about to reply when the door chimed. He pressed a button and it opened to admit a Hirogen who had to duck his head and bend his back to get through. Betaan was an alpha who led the hunting party that had originally volunteered to accompany TF7 eastwards from Jenolan. Hirogen space was largely southwest of there, towards the Beta Quadrant, but other than the Borg and the Voth, they had the best knowledge of Delta Quadrant geography. As for Betaan himself, many of the TF7 COs had come to have a healthy respect for him. Knowing that Hirogen weren't big on the concept of sitting, he didn't offer the 2.3 metre tall alpha a seat.

"Ah, Betaan. You'll need to look your most warm and neighbourly tomorrow. Also, what do believe are the chances of this being a trap?"

"Fairly high. We've always avoided this area until recently because of the conflict between the Voth and Borg out here, so we cannot verify the existence of these 'Obatalans', but for a species to have gone unmolested in an area such as that is… improbable. But then again, no one saw the Vaadwaur coming until it was too late. That said, the Krenim managed to hide themselves, so anything is possible."

"Those are our thoughts as well." Mauris mused. "We've got supply ships coming through the gate later today to stock us up on replicator mass and torpedoes, so we'll be looking to leave this time tomorrow. I plan on having a look at the system to formulate an approach plan right now with the three of you."

=A=

The next morning, the area around Sonhadra Station was a hive of activity. Wing 72 had formed up around the enormous bulk of the two Jupiter and Atrox class carriers that made up its core. Wing 74 was in the process of forming up behind them, looking to piggyback until such time as they had to separate. Behind that again was Betaan's hunting squadron, bolstered by reinforcements he had managed to acquire.

Blackmoore, eager for something other than patrol or logistics duties, had taken Wing 73 a couple of hours earlier.

72 disappeared into warp and once 74 had formed up, they proceeded to do the same. The trip was uneventful.

=A=

 _"We'll be going fairly slowly. If you run into trouble, get a transmission out. Our QSDs will be primed."_ Rezkki instructed.

"Same applies to you." Mauris responded.

Rezkki nodded and cut the transmission, leaving the Starfleet seal on Mauris' viewscreen.

72 continued on its way, and 74 dropped from warp long enough to make a 45 degree turn. The trip to Obatala would take most of what remained of the day without using slipstream.

Long range sensor sweeps were devoid of any other reading but Wing 72 as it continued to the northwest.

=A=

As planned, the combined Starfleet/Hirogen task force had taken a high polar orbit of an outer-system gas giant that had a moderate magnetic field. Passive sensors were still showing activity around Obatala III itself, but they hadn't picked up any evidence of inbound or outbound warp activity. For what had been reported as a potentially expansionistic and very much FTL capable species, the lack of movement in and out of the system was puzzling.

Mauris ordered the USS Sreley brought to the front of the formation. The Magellan-class being the only ship in the wing with an elite sensor package able to cut through the interference generated by the planet. He remained in contact with its captain, a stony-faced Vulcan named Stravim, as it prepared to conduct a more concentrated scan of Obatala III.

It was at that moment that the comms officer on the floor above on the bridge proper spoke.

"We're being hailed."

After a notable pause, Mauris heard Captain Stewart order, "Put it on screen downstairs".

With no time to process the exercise in upward delegation, Mauris was confronted with what he could only assume was an Obatalan.

He or she was vaguely insectoid in appearance. Greenish black skin and mandibles like you would see on a Xindi Insectoid, but with humanoid shaped eyes with elliptical irises. Mauris was uncomfortably aware that this creature did not look all that dissimilar to a Solanae.

 _"Welcome, travellers."_ It said in a rather flat, monotonous buzzing drone. _"Please proceed to the following coordinates, so that the first contact formalities can begin."_ Without waiting for a reply, the transmission was cut.

At that point, several members of the crew each began to make reports simultaneously. None of them were good.

Mauris noticed that the Caitian LCDR who ran his CIC on the lower floor of the bridge was beginning to replay the message, muted. She was staring intently at it, her ears slightly flattened.

"Sir, I'm not sure that is actually a flesh and blood creature."

"What makes you say that?" Mauris was confused.

"With respect sir, I'm Caitian. We have among the best eyesight of any Federation species. You may not be able to see it, but I can. There's see a subtle flickering in the image that is consistent with what I see on EHs and holodeck characters. That's why you don't see us using us using holodecks much - it ruins the immersion."

"Could it be caused by the interference caused by the magnetic field of the planet?"

She shrugged. "Possibly, but we're using standard technique when scouting solar systems. That image is fairly clean."

At the same time, on the floor above, the comms officer was speaking urgently to Captain Stewart, who had approached the console where the young human ensign was working.

"That voice was speaking Federation standard, Ma'am. I'm not reading any evidence of UT involvement in what just came through. What's more, if I didn't know any better, I'd say that the voice was digitally generated."

Stewart's brow furrowed. "Not that I doubt you, Ensign, but I want you to collaborate with your counterpart on the Sreley. We'll need more than just assumptions."

The Ensign nodded and got to work. The ops officer, who had been waiting to speak while Stewart had been talking to the comms officer, now reported with a look of concern.

"Captain. As a precaution, I've tried to trace the signal's point of origin. From what I can tell, it wasn't the third planet in the system. In fact, I'm having trouble establishing what it might have been."

"Have you verified this with other ships?"

"Yes Ma'am." replied the Argalian. " Both the Sonneillon and the Sreley are saying the same thing."

"Talk to some of the other ships. See what they say. And keep trying to trace the origin point."

With that she hurried down the steps that followed the contour of the Odyssey-type bridge module that led to the lower floor, which on flagships served as an admiral's CIC.

Mauris heard someone coming down the stairs and turned around. He listened to what Stewart had to say with growing concern, then appeared to make some sort of decision. He turned to another one of his staff, a LTJG.

"Raise Captain Dewyer on the Naberius" he ordered, before turning back to Stewart. "You're swapping back, effective immediately. Find Deltcheva and get yourselves beamed straight to the bridge."

"I just love it when you get all flag officer." she said with a smirk, before hardening her expression and following the order. Her heeled boots clattered against the stairs as she hurried towards the transporter bay at the back of the bridge.

He then addressed the Caitian LCDR. "Instruct all ships except the Sreley to power down to silent running."

Mauris turned back to Stravim, who he had almost forgotten was still watching all this unfold from from his chair on the Sreley.

"Captain. Run a tight-focus scan on Obatala III with all the power you can muster. Something very strange is happening here."

 _"I had anticipated that you would ask this, Admiral. The scan will commence momentarily and take 37 seconds, given our distance from the planet."_

Mauris watched as Stravim brought up a holo-screen in front of his chair. His eyebrow arched in that curiously Vulcan way as he studied the results.

 _"Admiral, I believe we may have a problem. The-"_

There was a brief roar of static on the screen. Stravim looked at someone out of the picture, presumably his operations officer. After a moment, the image cleared.

"We lost you, Sreley. Please repeat last transmission" Mauris said.

 _"The planet is no longer scanning as class-M. It now registers as class-H and uninhabited, with only a single installation in orbit. We hypothesise that this was behind the false sensor readings."_

"And the welcome message we saw?" Mauris pressed.

 _"Is curious. As far as we can ascertain, it did not come from the installation, but we still cannot determine the origin point. However, it does seem as though it was aimed directly at us. Whoever sent it knows that we are here."_

"Is there anyone aboard the installation?"

 _"We can read no life signs, nor any breathable atmosphere. However, there is an internal structure that matches what could be found on a habitable station."_

Mauris frowned. "Change your scans to 360-degrees and long range. Keep running them until further notice. Nysrogh, out."

When Stravim had vanished off the screen, Mauris pressed a button and moments later McCode, Neves and Betaan took his place.

"McCode, prep your MACO squads. Sealed armour." Mauris ordered. "As long as we're here, we may as well try and get some answers. Have your squadrons rendezvous at the following coordinates at warp 1.5."

The three senior captains acknowledged the order and signed off.

=A=

Wing 74's main MACO attachment was based aboard a Concorde-class, the Onoskelis, captained by Targrel, who had himself been a former MACO in his NCO days. It was the dark-furred Caitian that watched on via a viewscreen in his ready room as a dozen or so of the troops, led by Lieutenant Colonel R'hasa (also a Caitian) beamed into a large room that was thought to be the control room of the orbiting station. The familiar hiss of inhale-exhale was clear on the channel.

 _"Looks like a mixture of Borg tech and... something else."_ one of the troopers observed.

 _"Eyes open. We're all aware of what Borg installations are capable of. Don't touch anything unless you have to." R'hasa said. "See if you can find some sort of master control panel or computer input."_

The troopers, a mix of lower-rank officers and NCOs chosen to give them experience in Borg conditions with no drones about, fanned out in pairs to scan the room, which Targrel guessed was in at least semi-darkness, given the feed he was getting from R'hasa's helmetcam.

After a minute or so, one of them called out. Targrel felt a moment of motion sickness as R'hasa whirled through 180 degrees to find an E-2 pointing to an inconspicuous wall socket.

 _"You think that's it?"_ his partner asked, the tone of her voice indicating skepticism.

 _"Hell if I know. I don't see anything else that could be what we're looking for."_

An O-3 walked over, brandishing what looked like an uprated tricorder.

 _"I can't access it remotely"_ she said. She unshouldered an armoured backpack and proceeded to rummage through it, eventually a producing an adaptor that looked like it might fit. She fixed one end to her tricorder and inserted the other end into the socket.

 _"Grab what you can and then let's get out of here."_ R'hasa growled. _"Empty Borg installations are almost creepier than the ones crawling with drones."_

 _"I know what you mean_ " someone else replied. _"It'd almost be better if we had something to shoot at, rather than all this silen-"_

With no warning, the room was flooded in light as the environmental systems kicked in. The wall in front of the O-3, which had appeared completely innocuous a moment before, now seemed to come to life as black tendrils shot out from openings in its surface, pinning her arms to her sides and her legs together in an instant. The wall then opened up and she was drawn inside, abruptly cutting off her scream.

No sooner had R'hasa had turned around to witness this than one of the others, who had also been standing near a wall, began to call for help. He too had been snared, but not so completely. He had managed to free his right arm and was hacking at the biosynthetic tendrils with his combat knife, but no sooner had he severed them than they reasserted their hold.

At that moment, there was a familiar shimmer of a transporter containment beam and a number of large humanoids coalesced into being. It was a group of Hirogen hunters. Some of them were carrying weapons that R'hasa hadn't seen before. They appeared to be large handsaws, with a large rotating circular blade at one end. A pair of hunters ran over to the stricken marine, one of whom had one of these cutting weapons. One quick downward swipe later, and the marine was free and scrambling towards the middle of the room.

His companion was brandishing what looked like a plasma flamethrower. He gave the wall at that point a liberal coating of the glowing green substance, temporarily stopping any new surprises from that panel and the ones adjacent. The two hunters backed away towards where the others were waiting. Since the room now had an atmosphere, the harsh, metallic buzz of the saws was clearly audible. Yet another Hirogen was setting up some sort of device in the centre of the room.

The hunter in charge turned to R'hasa. "There's no way you'll get anything useful from here now. I suggest you leave. We'll cover you."

"With you here, we might still walk away from this with something." R'hasa protested.

"It's only a matter of time until this facility adapts to the jamming." The Hunter said, pointing to the device. "Be thankful those things don't start coming up out of the floor as well. Go."

R'hasa opened his mouth to speak again, but thought better of it. In any case, he found himself caught in the constraint of a transporter beam. Targrel had seen enough, and had ordered the MACOs beamed out.

=A=

Back aboard the Nysrogh, Mauris had also been watching the feed. He made a mental note to speak to Betaan about getting some updated anti-borg training for his own MACO compliment. That would have to wait though.

"Have every ship transport a torpedo onto that thing. I don't want it left here for others to stumble into."

One by one, the nearby ships acknowledged that the order had been followed. 40-plus torpedoes seemed a bit overkill, but after what had happened he wasn't about to take any chances. He gave a signal, and the station was ripped apart. There wouldn't be enough left to study, and he would probably be 'spoken to' about that, but their curiosity had already cost one MACO her life and severely traumatised at least one more.

His console gave an urgent chime. It was the Sreley again, but this time, the hail was priority one.

He acknowledged the hail and Stravim appeared on screen. Mauris had served alongside a large number of Vulcans over the decades and he had learned to read when one might be anxious or stressed. Stravim was looking like that right now and he began to speak without being prompted.

 _"Admiral, we are detecting a Borg vessel approaching the system at transwarp speed."_

Mauris looked confused. "Just one? What's the configuration?"

" _The vessel appears to be a standard battleship-spec cube, but it is the nature of the vessel that is… fascinating."_

Captain Dewyer weighed into the conversation at this point. She was lighter on her feet than Amber Stewart, so Mauris hadn't registered her coming down the stairs.

"What's so special about one cube? It won't last more than a couple of minutes against 40 ships," she asked.

Stravim raised an eyebrow, which Mauris took to mean 'I don't believe I was talking to you' but answered the question anyway.

 _"We are unable to say with any certainty, but even at this distance our sensors are registering an energy signature that does not match with anything in our databanks."_

"If the Borg have another new trick, we have an obligation to at least try to find out what it is." Mauris said resolutely. "What is its ETA, Captain?"

 _"At current speed, 31 minutes."_

"Well, that's something." Mauris addressed his aide. "Have all ships power up from silent running and go to yellow alert. Move us to these coordinates." he ordered, highlighting a spot between the fourth and fifth planets.

Next, he turned to Captain Dewyer. "Shift your crews around and prepare for chev-sep, but don't execute until I give the order."

Dewyer nodded and hurried back to the main part of bridge. Seconds later, her voice could be heard over the PA summoning alpha shift bridge crew to the battle bridge and the beta shift crew to the main bridge. Mauris looked at his display. With the Nysrogh now powered back up to nominal, her own sensors could now pick up the approaching cube, which showed as a pulsating red blob on the plot.

=A=

 **Cube 9871**

 **Destination: System 782-D14**

 **Targets Identified: Species 478 - Hirogen. Objective: Entrapment and assimilation.**

 **Multi species entity 'United Federation of Planets'. Objectives: Entrapment and assimilation.**

 **ERROR: Objective override.**

 **Multi species entity 'United Federation of Planets'. Objectives: Entrapment and destruction.**

 **Execute objective 'entrapment' upon arrival.**

 **Power diversion to inhibitor and shields on standby.**

 **Time to intercept: Imminent.**

=A=

The assembled task force registered the tear in subspace as the cube exited transwarp, but once it had arrived, it merely sat there, not moving, just out of weapons range. It didn't take long for most of the on duty science bridge officers to work out why; the cube was generating a warp inhibitor field.

Mauris, highly annoyed at having been taken in by this ruse, ordered the wing forward at full impulse, with orders to engage and destroy the cube.

The cube, which scanned as unarmed, moved away. It was also noted that it hadn't broadcast the usual 'lower your shields, blah blah blah futile' spiel either.

Mauris was mulling this over when he received another hail. It was from the Sreley again. He acknowledged the hail with a mounting sense of frustration.

"What's the bad news this time Captain?"

 _"Admiral. We have just picked up numerous further incoming contacts."_

"How many is 'numerous?'"

 _"One thousand, three hundred and seventy eight."_

"That many? Talk about overkill."

 _"It is a logical number of ships, given that their objective appears, using flight trajectories as a guide, to be to blockade the system by completely surrounding us at the orbit of the fifth planet."_

Mauris swore under his breath. "All while our new 'friend' over there stops us from warping out. Clever bastards. What's their ETA?"

 _"The ships comprising the blockade closer to Borg space should be in position in less than a minute. We have no estimate yet when the blockade will be complete."_

Mauris pressed a was a dull thunk noise and a vibration through the floor as the clamps holding the chevron in place released.

"Once the blockade is fully in place, start a tactical analysis. Look for weak spots we might be able to punch through. Keep this channel clear until you have something. Mauris, out."

Turning back to his tactical feed, Mauris noted that a few of the more nimble escorts had managed to get within striking distance of the inhibitor cube by using a subnucleonic beam to temporarily shut down its engines, but could do little more than plink ineffectively away at its reinforced shields. It was looking increasingly as though they would have to fight their way out of this, or die trying. A message had been sent to Admiral Rezkii, who had spun Wing 72 around and were even now slipstreaming towards Wing 74s position. What they could do when they arrived, however, was still anybody's guess.

It took roughly ten minutes for the borg ships on the far side of the blockade from their approach vector to form up. They then began, slowly, to close the spherical blockade by inching inwards.

Using analysis from some of the hardened tactical specialists in the wing, it was ascertained that there were no obvious weak spots in the blockade - whoever was pulling the Collective's strings was a hell of a logistics expert.

Knowing that, Mauris had made the call to simply form a wedge and try to punch through to where he knew Wing 72, who by now were less than 5 minutes out, would be waiting beyond the range of the inhibitor field. They would flank the Borg from behind and try to draw at least some of the fire away from 74.

"Time to intercept?" Mauris asked.

"48 seconds," his aide confirmed, before doing a double take. "Wait, we've got another reading coming up, fore and to starboard. Looks like some kind of portal."

"You've got to be kidding. Don't tell me we've got Iconians now as well?"

"Readings are still coming in, but I don't think so, sir. This rift...correction…these rifts appear more like what we've encountered from-"

 _The weak shall perish._

"-the Undine".

"You're positive? The rifts are fluidic?" Mauris asked.

"There's no mistaking it, sir."

"Well, shit." Mauris said, hurriedly reaching for the scatter button on his fleet control station. "We're either about to get caught in the middle of the mother of all furballs or blown to bits by both sides."

Even as the task force scattered, recording devices on the chevron picked up something Mauris had seen a lot, firstly in the Solanae Sphere, then over Earth and Qonos. A mid sized vessel, designated a 'Dactylus' class by Alliance Intelligence, had emerged from a portal and was holding station while eight smaller craft, known as 'Nicors', formed a ring around and just behind it. As they watched, the Nicors fired their main energy projectors into an energy collector at the aft end of the Dactylus. All anyone in the allied task force could do was hope that the result was not aimed at them…

It wasn't.

A lance of energy abruptly issued from the fore end of the Dactylus and before anyone could blink, there was a blinding flash. The inhibitor cube.

Mauris heard the beta shift officer of the watch upstairs shout loud enough to cause distortion in the PA.

 _"All hands, brace for shockwave!"_

Without the benefit of the extra dampeners on the rest of the Nysrogh, the smaller chevron was tossed about wildly for several seconds before control could be reasserted.

Upstairs, the voices on the bridge began rattling off damage and casualty reports and his aide was saying something as well, but it was all interrupted as a voice, colossal in its scale and uncompromising in its tone, echoed through the heads of each and every person in the task force.

 _ **"Your shackles are broken. Go to your companions. If you are many, you will be stronger. You will not leave. You will stay to assist us as we have assisted you. The Borg have become puppets of the weak. And the weak must perish."**_

Mauris opened the fleet-wide comms and said "All ships, I suggest we do as they say. Stand by for the order to go to warp to rendezvous with Wing 72 on the other side of the blockade."

Knowing this, Captain Dewyer had ordered the Nysrogh to move into reintegration position. Mauris found himself thanking his lucky stars that the procedure could be done on the move…

=A=

In the cavernous space that functioned as the flag officer's control hub on a Jupiter-class carrier, Marekk Rezkki watched with interest as the tactical display lit up. Like Wing 74, Wing 72 had also heard the telepathic direction (or was it an ultimatum?) that the Undine had delivered.

According to the tactical analysis, the Borg had an advantage in numbers and firepower, but had been caught badly out of position by being thinly spread. The Dactylus and Nicors that had saved wing 74 had promptly gated out again, presumably to join up with the rest of the Undine fleet outside the spherical formation of Borg.

There was a subspace spike as Wing 74 and their Hirogen escort made the warp micro-jump. They appeared to starboard of Wing 72 only a couple of seconds later and began to move into formation some distance away. Meanwhile, the Borg were trying to condense their forces, but the logistics of putting a lot of 3km x 3km cubes into a small space was evidently using a great deal of processing power, even for the Borg. Thus, the Undine could simply form a wall and pick off whatever target they got to first. They were, as he had occasionally heard humans say, 'making hay while the sun shone.'

Regardless, it was quite something to see. It didn't have the sheer scale of the battle of Sol that had ended the Iconian War, but Borg/Undine engagements of this scale hadn't really been recorded.

It suddenly occurred to him that the second admiral's pip on his collar put him in charge of the allied ships nearby. Ever analytical, he realised that this would be an ideal opportunity for intelligence gathering. With this in mind, he hailed Mauris on the Nysrogh, who looked a little perplexed at being video-hailed in the middle of a battle.

"Mauris, have the Sreley stay back from the line. A battle of this scale gives us a lot of scope for info-gathering on both the Borg and the Undine. In particular, the Borg are using tricks we've not seen them use before."

 _"Well, that's not exactly news"_ Mauris replied. _"L'Miren told us that the Borg are T'Ket's latest patsy."_

"Right, but the Borg have given us no indication that they're under any sort of influence at all, other than greatly enhanced tactical fired on the heralds of L'Miren at Calbriden. If you ask me, there's another layer to all of this."

Mauris appeared to digest this. On Rezkki's main viewscreen, the Hirogen and Bethans were in the process of finishing off a damaged cube that had strayed close to where they were.

 _"I'll be interested to see what your line of thinking is here, but in the meantime, haven't we got a battle to get involved in before the Undine decide to turn their guns on us as well?"_

As if the Undine been listening in to the conversation (a distinct possibility, Rezkki supposed), both admirals had a flash in their mind's eyes of what looked like an Undine psi lord. It only lasted a fraction of a second, but the angry glare and telepathically transmitted sense of impatience was obvious.

Rezkki shook his head rapidly as if to clear it. "Right. Let's get to it then. Can you chev-sep?"

 _"Probably not a good idea. Chevron took some damage in that explosion."_

"Fine, but tell Dewyer to go easy. You get killed, it's my arse on the line. Stand by for orders."

He cut the transmission and turned to his tactical plot. He signalled the Delta Alliance ships to adopt whatever tactic they had developed for this situation. Their respective lead ships acknowledged and began to move in on a nearby cluster of spheres.

As for Wings 72 and 74, he ordered all ships to launch their small craft and concentrate on point defence and taking out probes. Wing 72 was almost entirely composed of ships with specialist hangar bays; besides the Forrestal and the Atrox-class Rashar, there was also a host of heavy escort carriers, heavy flight deck cruisers and Vesta family combat support ships. It was a concept he had come up with in conjunction with Admiral Carar before her reassignment to Starfleet Command, and he was always looking for chances to demonstrate its viability.

As he watched dozens of peregrines, stalkers, type 10 shuttles and the odd yellowstone, along with the 4 callisto-class light escorts carried by the Forrestal, began to stream from hangar bays and take up position among the larger vessels.

Thankfully, the Borg had devoted most of their runtime to the Undine, so when the Starfleet ships joined the battle, they carved into the Borg flank, mostly composed of flights of spheres and probes. Further over towards the Undine front, space was clogged with debris, forming a barrier of sorts that Borg reinforcements either had to divert around or risk being shredded by the wreckage if they attempted to go through. So far as they could tell, the Borg fleet had lost nearly a quarter of its ships by this point.

All at once, the Borg ships vanished, their combined entries into transwarp causing viewscreens across the fleet to wash out as more than a thousand ships entered transwarp simultaneously.

That was followed shortly after by the Undine themselves going to FTL speeds in pursuit. A single 'Tethys' class dreadnought remained.

Aboard their respective ships, both Rezkki and Mauris had to hold on to nearby consoles as their minds were flooded with more information than they could process. The images flashed by so fast that neither could make any sense of any of it. It was all a confused jumble of images and emotions. Once the telepathic onslaught had stopped, they heard the voice again.

 ** _"Here are some of the answers you seek. Use them wisely. Do not continue to waste time as you have until now. The many must survive, but some of the many must be reminded of their priorities, it seems."_**

Rezkki managed to organise his overstressed mind with some difficulty. "You're demanding that we help you now, but where were you when we fought the Iconians and their heralds before?"

Rezkki felt a wave of what could be described as annoyance." ** _Your position to be asking those questions is dubious, but we will indulge you, for now. We were divided after the Iconians deception and those of our own number who kept the truth from the many was fully revealed. The followers of the one you knew as 'Cooper' were found and… repurposed. That took time. The rest of what you must know, I have sent you."_**

"But how am I supposed to make sense of all of it? It all came so fast."

" ** _We have communicated in the best way your mind can perceive. It was the actions the Vulcan Tuvok that lifted the veil from our sight. Perhaps now he can lift the veil from yours. We understand he remained in this part of your galaxy when you withdrew to your own territories to fight the Iconians."_**

"I don't understand how you could know that."

 _ **"There is much you do not seem to understand, including the storm that is brewing."**_

And with that, the presence in his mind was gone. His staff were looking at him with concerned looks.

"What are you all looking at? You've never seen someone have a mental chat with the Undine before?" he asked, not without some irritation in his tone. He tapped a button his comms console.

"Rezkki to all ships. Set course for the Sonhadra system. Engage at warp 9 at one-three-five-two hours."

=A=

 _36 hours later, back at Sonhadra_

Mauris and Rezkki sat on a couch in VADM Desyox's office on the Chevalier, looking drained. In transit back from Obatala, Rezkki had sent a message on ahead, and USS Voyager had been diverted to Sonhadra. It was the first time Tuvok had been here and he had described what had been accomplished as 'impressive'.

Now though, he stood stoically opposite the two Wing leaders, eyes closed, appearing to process what he had seen during mind melds with them. On the other couch, Blackmoore was reviewing data from the battle, seemingly without too much interest in what Tuvok and the others were doing. He jumped a little when the dark skinned Vulcan, now sporting a second admiral's pip on his collar, began to speak.

"The telepathic imagery provided to you by the Undine is surprisingly concise. In time, I believe your minds would have been able to organise it enough to understand it. I have merely sped up the process."

"So what do they have to say?" Desyox prompted.

"I can confirm that what L'Miren theorised to you is true. T'Ket and her heralds are using the Borg as an additional proxy in the Delta Quadrant. It seems they co-opted the collective by installing a new queen at some point soon after we reached our armistice with L'Miren at the Sol System. In addition to trying to regain a foothold in the Beta Quadrant by rebuilding the gate at Calbriden, they also established a new unimatrix in Fluidic space."

"So they're instantly fighting a war on multiple fronts again?" Blackmoore said. "T'Ket hasn't learned a damned thing about tactics."

"Not quite, Admiral." Tuvok replied. "This new unimatrix was much smaller than the one I encountered in 2411. It seems that the Undine discovered it by chance and that was merely an observation post. Instead of destroying it outright, they boarded it and downloaded the contents of its vinculum. The evidence of T'Ket's involvement was buried deep, but they eventually found it. They have been fighting the Heralds of T'Ket ever since."

"Which explains why the threats that T'Ket apparently made at the time of the armistice haven't really been followed through." Desyox mused. "The attacks on Qonos that were promised never materialised."

"And the only retribution the Romulans have seen is the Elachi attack on Tephrei, which the Republic and the Star Empire were able to repel." Mauris added.

"That was just pants on head stupid." Blackmoore snarked. "All it did was bring the two Romulan states closer together."

"The Republic Fleet crossing the border to help the Star Navy may not have been foreseen." Tuvok said. "Either way, it has still had the effect of keeping them occupied, thus preventing them from providing any assistance here, despite the apparent magnitude of the threat."

"So what now?" Rezkki asked. His mouth then contorted in what might have been the Saurian equivalent of a yawn.

Desyox pursed his lips. "Tuvok, get underway for Jenolan and relay all of this to Admiral Rexx and DA command. I'll brief the DA commanders here. Blackmoore, get to work on a new defence rotation for Sonhadra. I want to see a draft in the next 24 hours."

He turned to Mauris and Rezkki. "As for you two, get some rest. You both look about done in. Dismissed."

The two mentally and physically exhausted rear admirals shuffled out, heading for the nearest transporter room. Desyox called Tuvok to remain. The Vulcan raised a questioning eyebrow.

"See if you can get someone from the diplomatic corps here as well - and I don't mean Sugihara. I want someone better equipped to do all that posturing stuff that the Voth do, not someone who'll just bore them back behind their line in the sand. We're going to need more than just an NAP with them if the Undine assessment of things is correct."

"If I might make a suggestion, the Krenim may also be in a position to help if asked." Tuvok said.

Desyox sighed. "All fifteen or so of them that are left? If you must. There's something... off about the Krenim if you ask me. It's ships and fleets we need, not airy fairy temporal theory. Let's do it by the book this time."

"Operation midnight-"

"Was a gamble that just happened to pay off." Desyox interrupted, barely managing to hide his irritation. "With the information given to us by the Undine, we might be able to finally make some forward progress in this ordeal. We're only fighting one weakened Iconian and it sounds like the Undine are keeping her occupied. Think of this, Tuvok; We might finally be able to put an end to the Borg menace once and for all and we could say we did it without resorting to some _deus ex machina_."

"Damn right. They'll talk about it for centuries." Blackmoore put in. Desyox and Tuvok quickly looked in that direction; they'd quite forgotten that the human was still in the room.

"Very well, Vice Admiral. I will relay your thoughts to Admiral Rexx" Tuvok droned.

"You don't report to me, Tuvok. Your job isn't to be my messenger boy. I'll be talking to Rexx over subspace later today, so he'll get my views then. Your job is to work with the DA militaries in order to get them to see the magnitude of the threat to their own area of space as well as the opportunities this system represents."

"As little as I needed to be reminded of my job description, your points are logical ones. If you do not mind, I would like to get to depart immediately in order to begin those discussions." The Vulcan's face remained impassive, but Desyox thought he detected a slight note of chagrin in the delivery. A glance in the direction of a smirking Blackmoore helped confirm that he thought the same.

Desyox softened his tone. "Look, Tuvok. We're all on the same team here. I'll look at any solution that seems viable, but let's not jump at the first 'easy out' that presents itself."

"Understood, Admiral." Tuvok concluded. Then, without being dismissed, he strode out.


End file.
